


If You Were Church (I'd Get On My Knees)

by FelOllie



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Canon, Angel Castiel (Supernatural), Bisexual Dean Winchester, Canon-Typical Violence, Case Fic, Dean Winchester Feels, Discussions of Sexual Assault/Harassment, Emotionally Repressed Dean Winchester, Ghosts, M/M, No Dean/Other(s), Original Female Witch Character - Freeform, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Religious Content, Those scenes occur in the past and are entirely off-screen, probably blasphemy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-08
Updated: 2018-12-13
Packaged: 2019-08-20 18:27:03
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16560992
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FelOllie/pseuds/FelOllie
Summary: An old friend has a ghost problem brewing in her hometown.The cavalry arrives in the form of Sam, Dean, Cas & Co.While attempting to sort out their case, Dean and Castiel stumble into sorting out their shit.(Sam might have pushed them, but he isn't the only one)





	1. The Hub of Yup

**Author's Note:**

> Hello again, you lovely people.
> 
> Full transparency, this is a WiP. I wasn't going to post until it was complete, but it's been a terrible day and I think we could all use some levity. This is my contribution to (hopefully) good things in the world, since it's all I can muster. 
> 
> I love you and I hope you find a reason to smile today.

“You’re jerking my chain here, right?” 

Cas regards him with fond, mildly vexed eyes, squinting them pointedly in his direction. “No, Dean, I am not ‘jerking your chain’. I’m not sure how I would even set about--”

Sam clears his throat, lips tipped up far too much to denote anything but amusement. Dean wants to kick him square in the shins. Instead, he opts for casually flipping his brother the bird.

Like the mature adult that he is.

“Haunted grub depot?” Dean asks, swinging his full attention back to Cas and cocking an incredulous eyebrow. “Who’s writing this shit?”

Cas’ expression slides into begrudgingly entertained irritation. Which… fair. That particular river flows in both directions; why bother trying to alter its course now?

“This girl -- Pepper?” Cas nods. Dean snorts attractively. “Pepper. She give you anything else?”

Sam tosses a file down on the War Room’s map table, open so that its contents scatter a little. 

“Not much,” he says, waving a hand at the manilla folder, “but I already pulled these. The store is built where a Catholic church stood up until about two years ago.”

Cas grunts displeasure at that, and Dean kind of gets it. It feels way too close to sacrilege, even for him. He can’t imagine how Cas feels about them erecting a fucking _grocery store_ where religious services were once held -- A House of God stood there proudly for more than a century and now it’s a yuppie hub, complete with butcher, floral, _and_ bakery departments, if the file’s guts are to be believed. 

Who _does_ that?

Sam grimaces sympathetically but continues, “Pepper started at the store about a year and change back. In that time, two people have died messy on-site, six have incurred serious bodily harm, and last week, the GM ate a bullet from his own Desert Eagle and was discovered ass-up in a… frosting mixer.”

“Shit like this is why I prefer pie,” Dean tosses out at Sam’s disgusted shudder. “What do the local boys think?”

“The local authorities seem to believe the situation is nothing more than a series of unfortunate circumstances,” Cas intones. He collapses into the chair beside Dean, the flutter of his coat blowing a chilled breeze across Dean’s ankles. He resists the urge to shiver. “Sheriff Hanscum is attempting to pull some strings with her contacts in the area, though I suspect that will be quite a difficult endeavor given the nature of the case.”

This time, Dean’s inquisitive eyebrow hefts toward his brother. “Donna?”

Sam shrugs. “Apparently the Academy she went to isn’t all that far from the job.”

Dean smiles a little. He loves working with Donna, no matter the capacity. The woman is a badass with a heart of gold and killer sense of humor; Dean would be in love if he weren’t already--

Whatever.

“So, uh, how did we land this gig again?” Dean asks.

“You remember the demon thing in upstate New York, right? The girl who lost her brother?”

What Dean remembers most about that case in particular is the nineteen year old sister of their victim, who they met while on it. He hasn’t let many witches skate after all, and that job had lingered in more ways than one.

Besides, the witch in question was a solitary practitioner who stumbled into something she shouldn’t have by absolutely no fault of her own. Taking her out felt a hundred different shades of wrong, especially after the case wrapped up, so they let her go with a gentle reminder to stay on the right side of the Light/Dark divide.

Sam knows for a fact that Dean remembers both the case and the girl. Of course he does. Sam knows pretty much everything there is to know about his big brother. He’s being deliberately vague and Dean appreciates the uncharacteristic subtlety.

“Emily, yeah. That little hellion can take down a grown ass man,” Dean remembers with a wince, rubbing surreptitiously at his right hip under the table. 

That had been harder to let go of than the witch thing, honestly. Wounded pride is a helluva drug.

Sam chuckles. “That’s the one. Pepper is a friend. Not a witch friend, a friend friend. Emily gave her my number and told her to name drop.”

“How long ago was this incident?” Cas asks.

Dean shrugs. “We’re talking way back, Cas. Circa Meg 1.0, at least.”

“And she has retained your phone numbers all this time? How?”

Dean blushes and immediately wants to punch himself in the face. It’s nothing illicit or untoward, but that somehow makes it harder to cop to, especially to Cas, so he deflects like a pro.

“Who’s hungry?”

 

***

 

After breakfast has been squared away, Dean showers, packs a fresh go-bag, texts his mom to let her know they won’t be at the bunker when she gets back from wherever-the-hell with Jack and Ketch, and then heads for the garage. He’s wrist-deep in the inventory squirrelled away in Baby’s trunk when Sam joins him, slinging his own bag down next to Dean’s.

“You grab the extra--”

Sam drops another bag beside the first, its open zipper allowing the many tins of rock salt and accelerant to wink up at him. Dean rolls his eyes but grabs the bag and zips it up, tucking it as far back into the trunk as he can manage.

Apropos of nothing, Sam heaves out a heavily put-upon sigh and fixes his brother with a bored stare, saying “Why didn’t you just tell Cas about Emily?” like he has any right to it. He goes on, “I’m sure he would understand,” and Dean’s already heard more than enough.

He snatches his hands out of the trunk and slams it closed harder than he means too. He’s careful to give Baby an affectionately apologetic pat to her rear quarter panel before he rounds on Sam.

“Keep your trap shut, Sammy,” Dean orders evenly. “It’s none of your business -- or Cas’ for that matter. I’ll tell him when I’m good and ready.”

Sam shows his palms in surrender. “I’m just saying, Dean. Emily isn’t something you need to be ashamed of.”

“I’m not ashamed of her,” Dean sneers. 

“Could’ve fooled me.”

Dean watches Sam make his way into Baby’s backseat, folding his ginormous body to make it work. His eyes spit daggers all the while they track Sam’s movements. 

The little shit never knows when to let things ride.

“Dean?”

Spinning on his heels, Dean finds Cas slinking into the garage, duffel tossed over one shoulder, folded trench coat slung over the opposite forearm. He waves Cas forward, already reaching out to accept the bag. After he reopens the trunk and places Cas’ bag in among the others, he closes it once more and turns in time to catch the way Cas’ gaze snags just below where Dean’s belt rests. He feels his cheeks heat, but clears his throat and waves a hand toward the passenger side of the Impala.

“Shotgun’s free.”

Cas nods once and smiles, striding over to climb inside without comment. Dean blows out a hard breath between pressed lips and follows.

It’s going to be a long ride to New York.

 

***

 

They stop in Ohio for a refuel, both for themselves and Baby. Dean fills the gas tank, leaning against the trunk and rear bumper while Sam and Cas scour the little convenience store for something edible. Dean’s attention falls squarely on the numbers ticking up on the pump’s ancient analog dial. It makes something tighten in his gut, buried deeper than he’s buried the memories of losing his mother. Deeper than where he hides the memories of Alistair and The Rack -- The Pit in its entirety. The clenching feeling emanates from somewhere so deeply buried Dean’s not even sure where it is. 

Not knowing doesn’t stop the short swell of panic he feels as the numbers climb higher and higher on the dial. He feels like the pump is mocking him; a smug reminder that a hunter’s time is almost always near running out. That there’s never enough time to say all the things you think you can put off until tomorrow, never enough time to experience the things you want to experience, or the things you never considered you would ever admit to wanting in the first place.

The more the years drag on and Dean manages to keep breathing, the more he’s starting to itch for all the things he never thought he’d get to have. They’re starting to seem possible, and that is categorically terrifying. Toss in the ever-present hourglass, counting down to their final demise, a constant, haunting reminder, and is it any wonder Dean is starting to feel the strain?

The counter clicks over again and Dean curses under his breath, turning his back on the pump while it finishes. His gaze catches on Sam and Cas at the counter inside. He can’t hear what they’re saying, but their animated expressions and laughing eyes are obvious even from Dean’s vantage point.

 _Family_ , Dean thinks. 

It kind of hurts to see Cas and Sam so… fraternal. Not in a jealous way or anything, Dean knows that is patently ridiculous, but just -- It’s overwhelming. 

Knowing Cas loves Sam almost as fiercely as Dean himself, would kill and die for him? Knowing Sam would do the same for their Angel? Knowing that their mutual love for Dean is only part of the equation? That even if he bites it for good, Cas and Sam will stay bound?

It all makes his lungs push up uncomfortably against the inside of his ribcage and Dean has never been more thankful for modern technology when he feels his phone vibrate against his thigh. The name on the caller ID makes him smirk and his body immediately loses some of its rigidity.

“Donna, light of my life,” Dean greets affectionately as he presses the phone to his ear, “What’s up?”

Donna’s accented voice filters through the speaker, but it doesn’t lose an ounce of its trademark sparkle. ‘World’s prettiest iron cowboy!” she teases. “Where abouts are you boys?”

Dean catches sight of Sam coming toward him, Cas a few paces behind, and mouths ‘Donna’ as he points to the phone. He sets the gas pump and Baby to rights, then leaves her under Sam’s supervision and heads around the side of the building, toward the can.

“Middle of bumbfuck Ohio,” Dean says. “Just stopping for a fill-up. Should be there in about ten hours.”

“Oh, good!” Donna nearly vibrates through the phone in her excitement. “We’re not too far behind yous then.”

“We?”

“Ya, Jodes is riding shotgun and Eileen is bringing up the rear,” she informs him. “It’s just us though, the girls all had something better to do, apparently.”

“Alex is working!” Jody’s muffled voice reaches him.

“Ya, and Claire is… Well, Claire.” Donna snorts. “Patience and Charlie had some convention thingy? I dunno, Rowena picked ’em up yesterday.”

Dean absorbs that wealth of info and feels the weight on his shoulders ease up just a fraction. 

They have help now. 

_Family_. 

He’s trying to remember that.

“I didn’t realize you ladies were making the trip out?” Dean says, instead of sliding into the Chick Flick Moment his brain skitters toward.

“Oh, you betcha,” Donna says, and Dean can hear her nearly-salacious grin through the line. “Can’t let you boys have all the fun now, can we?”

 

***

 

They don’t go straight to a motel as they typically would, where they could change into (barely) Fed approved threads and head out to see what the case has to offer. Instead, when Dean steers the Impala down a quiet one-way street around mid-morning, he rolls to a stop in front of a well maintained two-story Victorian, painted grey and cream with accents of blue. 

As soon as he leaves the car, Dean is assaulted by memories. It feels like several thousand lifetimes ago that he and Sam parked in this exact spot, looking up at this exact house, but the memories remain crystal clear despite that: The pain in Emily’s eyes when she told them about her brother, Tommy, hands and lips trembling. The tears streaming down her high, full cheeks in whole rivulets when she sobbed and told them the world felt like Tommy wasn’t in it anymore.

Like the living embodiment of the memory Dean is drowning in, the front door opens and Emily McGuinness comes rushing down the long wooden porch, pink sweater flowing out behind her cape-style. This time, so unlike the first, she throws her arms around Dean’s shoulders and pulls him down to her as far as his considerable height will allow. He bends to help get himself closer.

“Hey, Wicked Witch of the North East,” Dean teases, relishing the fact that Emily’s curvy five-four frame can somehow make him feel like he’s being aggressively snuggled by a protective Mama bear.

“Winchester! How is my favorite reformed demon?” Emily beams up at him for a second when she pulls back, like she might actually expect an answer, but then she’s moving off to squeeze Sam around the torso in greeting too.

The warmth in Dean's chest lingers.

“Em, this is Castiel,” Dean says as he indicates his Angel. He prays to Chuck that Emily won’t start leaking emotions and shit all over the ground at Cas’ feet, but quickly realizes he shouldn’t have worried.

Emily simply turns wide, hazel-green eyes up to meet Cas’ spectacularly blue ones and doesn’t do much beyond smile welcomingly. 

“It’s nice to finally meet you, Castiel.” she says, “I’ve heard some wonderful things about you.”

Cas’ brow furrows. “I will assume, then, that you have also heard things that are not wonderful.”

Emily shrugs, the ends of her dark strawberry-blonde hair brushing her clavicle. There’s nothing but warm kindness and acceptance in her tone when she speaks again.

“Nobody is perfect. Besides, these two trust you with their lives; that’s good enough for me.”

Like it’s as simple as that. Like she _trusts_ them.

Like Dean hasn’t been absolutely terrified over the years that someone would find out about Emily and her connection to the Winchester Clan. Like he and Sam haven’t hired carefully selected hunters to check-in with her when they can’t do it themselves, making sure she’s still alive and fighting inside the life. 

Because she is. 

Of course she is. 

After losing her brother to a singularly fixated demon way back when, Emily chose to stay. She chose to fight the good fight. It scared the fuck out of Dean, Sam too, but she was an adult, and a white witch with a stubborn independent streak a hundred miles wide to boot, and they didn’t know how to stop her without binding or killing her. So when they parted ways, Dean put both his and Sam’s numbers in her phone and set them as one and two, respectively, on her speed dial.

“Thank you,” Cas says, like he means it. Like her easy acceptance has been missing all his life and he only just now realized it.

“Come on.” Emily beckons them toward the house. “My neighbors already know I’m weird, let’s not give them any more ammunition.”

Inside feels exactly like Dean remembers it, even though the furnishings have changed considerably over the years. The house belonged to Emily’s mother, who passed not long after losing her son. After that, Emily’s name went on the deed and she’d begun shifting the place away from the childhood home she’d always known, toward what it is now. 

An oasis.

In the handful of times Dean has seen the house since Emily became its owner, it’s always been in a state of transition. Shifting furniture, paint being swapped out, entire walls coming down -- you name it.

Beneath that though has always been Emily’s… aura, for lack of a better term. Her essence shines brightly, bright enough to fill this house with the peaceful, loving, and open vibe Emily herself generally gives off. 

Everything feels settled now in a way it hadn't before. 

Dean plops down onto an oversized grey couch with cushions made for napping, and kicks his sock-clad feet up onto the edge of the bamboo and glass coffee table. 

“Killer grocery store, Em?” Dean asks, his tone dripping disbelief. “Come on, that’s… that’s nuts, even for us.”

Sam hefts his gargantuan shoulders up just to let them fall back down. “We’ve seen weirder.”

“Have we?”

Emily sets down a bottle of whiskey on the table beside Dean’s feet, nudging them off onto the floor before sitting beside him and gesturing for Sam to grab glasses off the Globe-shaped bar cart in the corner. 

“It’s not the store, dumbass,” she laughs, “it’s the ghosts.”

Cas shifts forward further into the room, interested. “Ghosts? As in multiple spirits?”

Pepper hadn’t mentioned that when she spoke to Sam.

“Mmhmm,” Emily hums, pouring out four drinks and passing them around. “Restless spirits dredged up and pissed off by the demo and construction, would be my best guess.”

“Your friend Pepper, she’s an eyewitness?” Sam recalls.

Emily nods. “She’s on her way from the store right now.”

“She still works there?” Sam asks, genuine surprise shifting his features. 

Hiking a sarcastic, professionally-shaped eyebrow, Emily scoffs, “She’s got a newborn to support -- can’t exactly afford to be picky on the job front.”

Dean sips smugly from his glass, appreciating the subtle notes in the Irish whiskey and trying not to laugh at the embarrassed face Sam pulls.

“Right. Of course,” Sam says tightly, but Emily just grins kindly at him.

“She’s looking for something new,” she assures, “It’s just hard fought battles on the employment front around here. I’ve never been more thankful that my jobs can be done from almost anywhere.”

Just then a knock sounds from the entryway and a petite woman around Emily’s age peers around the corner, smiling hesitantly at the three giants lingering around the room before smiling genuinely at Emily herself. It’s gotta be Pepper, Dean thinks, and she instantly reminds him of one of those hippy, free-spirit, New Age types, with her black knitted messenger bag, woven through with stripes of red and yellow and green, and the flower crown perched around her head like a halo. Her eyes are serious though, and shine with the kind of grounded awareness the spacey types tend to lack.

“Sorry I’m late,” Pepper apologizes, already shrugging out of her vintage brown-suede jacket to drape it over the back of the wingback chair she sinks into. “They were repairing shit in the coolers and I couldn’t leave until they were done.”

“The boys don’t mind,” Emily promises, “This is what they do, Pep.”

“Emily is right, Pepper.” Sam smiles softly at her, puppy-dog eyes in full effect. “We just want to help.”

Before they know it, Pepper’s big brown eyes are filling with moisture, huge drops trailing down her cheeks. She twirls the long strands of her dark hair around her fingers and blows out a shuddering breath.

“I’ve been so scared,” she admits, “It was bad enough, what was going on in the store, but then it kept getting worse. And thinking that something might follow me home… get to my daughter? I didn’t know who else to ask for help. Emily has always been aces at this kinda thing, but she said you guys were the experts.”

“It’s okay,” Dean soothes, refilling his glass and handing it to her. “Just start at the beginning. What makes you think it’s a ghost?”

“Ghosts,” Emily corrects again, “Pretty sure there are at least four.”

“Okay, what makes you think it’s ghosts?”

Pepper gulps a huge swallow of her whiskey but doesn’t sputter. Dean is suitably impressed.

“It started in my department,” Pepper begins. “Or maybe that’s just the first place I noticed it? I’m not sure. I’d heard about some of the things that happened before I got there, but it all seemed pretty innocuous. Lights flickering, cold spots, stuff moving around on its own -- just typical ghost stuff. Em showed me some cleansing rituals or whatever, and so I… I thought it was safe.”

Dean bites his tongue. Ghosts -- the intelligent ones -- are rarely ever safe. He’s met a few Caspers in his time, but they’re more rare than… Well, just about anything.

“I used to talk to them, you know?” Pepper continues, “I mean, I knew they were probably pretty pissed that we were there at all, but I thought… I thought if I was sweet to them they’d see that I didn’t want to hurt them or anything. And it worked for the most part, I guess. The ghosts were pretty friendly. They used to leave flowers on my desk and help me clean up sometimes.”

“Full-on spectre?” Sam asks. “Did the ghosts take on any kind of physical form around you?”

Pepper shakes her head. “Mostly just shadows and mists. Sometimes… Sometimes I thought I could see a pair of children, maybe? A boy and a girl, I think. It was really only glimpses out of the corner of my eye.”

Sam nods along as he takes notes.

“When did the ghosts change, Pepper?” Cas questions, as delicately as he’s able. 

It comes out soft and warm and rumbling and Dean feels a swell of pride behind his sternum. Cas has really gotten the hang of the empathy thing.

Pepper flicks wet eyes up to Cas’, something behind them beginning to crumble. “Around the time I found out I was pregnant.” 

The smallness of it makes Dean’s stomach hurt.

“The ghosts, they just… They seemed more hostile, I guess. They stopped being nice and helpful, and started causing trouble. Little things, mostly. A broken vase in the cooler, a bucket of flowers tipped over, all my ribbon shredded down to tatters, a bunch of popped balloons. It was all pretty innocent though.”

“Until?” Dean prompts.

“Kelley Dushane.”

Sam frowns. “The first victim.”

“Yeah. He worked on the loading docks, unpacking trucks and stuff like that.”

“And what happened to him?” Dean asks, taking the empty glass from Pepper’s hands and refilling it. He slugs back what he poured out, then refills it again and hands it back to her. 

He doesn’t miss the marshmallow-soft smile Cas tries to hide. It makes his fingertips go numb.

Emily takes over for her friend, handing a thin stack of papers to Cas across the table. “He nearly lost a leg when he was partially crushed by a bottle return machine. It tipped over on top of him ‘somehow’. Police report ruled it an accident.”

“The report also notes that the pressure under which Dushane’s leg was crushed far exceeds what the bottle machine should generate,” Cas adds, looking over the report. 

“After that, it just got worse,” Pepper says. “Until last week, when… when Kevin--” 

Pepper covers her mouth to catch a sob and Emily hurls herself up from her spot beside Dean, launching her body across the room to envelope her friend in the coziest looking hug Dean has ever seen.

Clearly Pepper can’t take much more of this, and if they need anything specific they know how to reach her. Getting her home to her husband and infant daughter is much more necessary than what they’re doing here.

“Why don’t I give you a ride home?” Sam offers kindly. 

Emily and Pepper say goodbye while Dean tosses his keys to Sam and then scrubs his blunt nails over the stubble shadowing his jaw. Cas abandons his position holding up a nearby wall and perches on the cushion Emily had just vacated.

“Dean.”

Without looking, Dean hums. “Yeah, buddy.”

“You’re tired.”

“I’m always tired, Cas.”

He can feel Cas’ smile. “That’s because you are rapidly advancing in age.”

Dean barks out a surprised laugh, finally turning to meet Cas’ gaze. “Did you just call me old?”

The way humor crinkles the lines at the outer corner of Cas’ eyes makes Dean’s gut flip over on the alcohol he just drank. He scrubs a hand down his face, hoping it’ll clear his thoughts out a bit, but then immediately goes right back to drinking in that smile.

“So, who wants which bed?”

Cas and Dean both whip their heads up at the sound of Emily’s voice. They find her standing on the opposite side of the coffee table, hands on her hips and a tight smile plastering her mouth. 

Dean’s heart clenches, but he grins back. “What about a bed?”

Emily rolls her eyes toward the ceiling. “I have four guest bedrooms, Dean. Pick one.”

He frowns, already shaking his head. “We’ll just get a room--”

“You shut your whore mouth, Winchester,” Emily fires back, smiling a genuine smile. “I don’t get to see you boys often, much less all together. Besides, I’ll feel way safer in a house packed to the tits with burly hunters and an Angel of the Lord.”

Dean considers the offer. 

They don’t have a ton of cash at the moment, and though they do have an entire stash of credit cards for just such an occasion, the temptation of legitimately clean sheets and a warm, familiar face nearby easily sways him. He knows her plea for feeling safe is exaggerated at best -- Emily is more than capable of dealing with anything dumb enough to make her a target. She’s appealing to his need to protect and, predictably, it’s working.

“Cas?”

He simply shrugs his shoulders, placidly indifferent. “I do not require a bed, just a television. Whatever is best for you, Dean.”

Emily’s brows hike toward her hairline but she refrains from commenting. Dean loves her a little more than he did a second ago.

“Okay,” Dean relents. “I’ll text Sam, have him bring the bags in when he gets back.”

Emily beams.

 

***

 

A quick search of the upstairs to reacquaint himself with the floorplan, and Dean finds it a simple thing to choose a room. It sits snuggled between two others, a wall the only thing separating them. There’s a guest bathroom attached to Dean’s room on the wall he shares with Sam, as well as another across the hall. Cas chose the room on Dean’s other side, mostly because it does happen to have a television in it, and he doesn’t really need to sleep unless he wants to.

Emily begged off not long after Sam returned, citing a job she couldn’t postpone. That, of course, leaves the three of them to poke around inside her home without supervision. They keep their poking to a purely superficial level, respecting their friend’s privacy but still managing to satisfy their curiosity. Dean’s sure Em expects it of them anyway, and who are they to disappoint?

“Your friend has quite a lot of marijuana in her kitchen.” Cas observes dryly, entering the office space where Sam and Dean were directed to set up basecamp.

It’s Emily’s, obviously, and the desk is littered with chaos: tiny succulents planted in tiny hammered-copper pots, a mess of paperwork Dean’s sure Em should have gotten done weeks ago, a silver blade with a carved oak handle that Sam recognizes as one he’d given her, an intricate, ancient looking rose gold and opal bracelet Dean thinks Emily’s Dad gave her and a signed football he knows was Tommy’s, an empty coffee cup that still smells like hazelnuts and is shaped like an owl.

Her entire life is sprawled out haphazardly here; a microcosm of her entire existence, and it's tossed around for just anyone to see. Dean grits his teeth against the urge to hide stuff away and turns toward the sound of Cas’ voice.

“It's her specialty,” Sam says of the pot revelation. “Edibles too.”

“Edible what?”

Dean laughs then, throwing his head back as he grips Cas by the shoulder. “Pot brownies, Cas. Stuff you can cram into your piehole that's like… reefer infused. Some people use ‘em for medicine, some use ‘em for funsies.” 

He punctuates that by waggling suggestive brows at the Angel.

“Your witch, who is also a hunter, is also a medicine woman?”

“Em's a fucking badass, man, I'm telling you. She's so talented it's practically obnoxious.”

Sam hums his agreement, “She's an exceptional Mental Health Specialist too,” he says absently.

Every last drop of saliva in Dean's body dries up. His mouth feels like it did after he clawed his way out of the ground, after Cas raised him, and there’s a ringing in his ears that he prays won't blow out the windows.

A nearly endless pause hangs in the air, no one wanting to touch it for fear of it crashing down around them. Or maybe Dean's the only one who notices it there, hanging and waiting.

Mocking.

When Cas speaks though, Dean knows his anxiety is getting the better of him. No one noticed his moment of blind panic but him. 

It’s fine, he’s fine.

“Is she not also an excellent fighter?” Cas questions, clearly set on trying to figure Emily out. “You mentioned someone of her stature besting a man who is, presumably, much larger than she is.”

“Twice her size, easily,” Dean supplies, glad to hear his voice is steady. “Nearly dislocated my hip.”

Sam chuckles, “Cas, she saved his bacon. What's a little near-dislocation in that trade off?”

Cas’ expression goes soft and thoughtful. “She saved you?” he asks Dean, observing him so, so closely.

Dean fidgets under the careful scrutiny, chews his bottom lip between his teeth until it hurts.

“Yeah, she… Uh, Emily, she went with us when we… We gave Tommy a Hunter’s Funeral. We figured the demon was long gone, so I didn't see the harm in letting her tag along. He was her brother.”

His voice cracks then, but Dean can still hear the pained intake of breath beside him. Sam knows that Dean relates to Emily on that level. Hell, Sam relates himself, to a certain degree.

But Dean and Emily have far more in common than too much love for their brothers.

Dean and Emily are both the eldest of only two. They both lost a parent, were both raised by the remaining parent, who relied too heavily on them way too early, who put too much responsibility on their too young shoulders. Dean and Emily both grew up knowing that they were their brother's keeper. They both failed when they lost him.

Only one of them found him again.

Dean clears his throat, jaw clenching in time with his fist. 

Slow. Deliberate.

“After Em lit the pyre, we were just trying to comfort her, you know?” he grinds out, “I mean, we're used to burning our bodies, but she didn't… She never expected she'd lose her brother, how could she expect she'd have to do something like that? Anyway, I guess I was distracted, because the demon came back in a shiny new meatsuit and was doing his damndest to rip my fucking lungs out. If Em hadn't been there, with Sam out and me about to be much, much more dead, it would have been permanent lights out.”

“Emily saved you.”

It isn't a question this time.

“Yeah,” Dean says, giving one hard dip of his chin. “She picked up Ruby's knife from where Sam dropped it and straight up Gronked this mother. Took me down hard, little linebacker, but she saved my ass. The demon lunged for us, she lunged back, he sparked out, and I had to ice my hip for almost a week.”

“His pride even longer,” Sam huffs.

Cas’ eyes narrow in that way they do, like he’s trying to parse out what’s hiding behind what Dean isn't saying. There’s no way he can know, Dean’s sure of that, but… Hell, maybe he can. Cas always seems able to see through Dean’s facade like it isn’t even there. He sees Dean’s _soul_ , after all, and maybe he can read it as easily as scripture. 

Practiced. Confident in his interpretation.

Dean feels naked. Which instantly makes him think of actually being naked in front of Cas, and that starts a whole other spiral.

“In closing, Emily is the baddest,” he grumbles, giving his attention back to the case files spread out on a collapsible card table set up in the center of Emily’s office. He looks to a spot circled green on the city map, then several more circled red further out. “This the store?” he asks of the green one.

“Yeah,” Sam affirms, glancing up from the book he’s leafing through. “The red ones are the houses of the victims. I was looking for a pattern to the attacks, but there isn’t one. Other than the fact that they all worked at the store.”

Dean glares at the map. There’s a yellow circle he missed the first go ‘round.

“Why is Em’s house circled?”

Setting down his book for good, Sam stands and towers over the map. “She’s the one who gave Pepper the cleansing rituals. It’s mostly for reference, Dean.”

“Mostly?”

Sam gives him a sheepish grimace. “Just in case,” he says, much gentler than he usually would. “We don’t know what the spooks know, man. I figured it was safer this way.”

“Covering all the bases,” Cas adds helpfully, but he’s watching again. 

Watching Dean, specifically. Like he’s waiting for something. Something more than what they’re typically both waiting for. It’s like Cas knows something is wonky, he just can’t tell what yet.

Dean’s phone vibrates, giving him the excuse he needs to turn his back on the room and away from those searching eyes.

“Winchester.” He listens attentively for a beat. “Alright, we’ll meet you over there,” he says, hanging up. To his brother and his Angel he explains, “Ladies just rolled in. They’ve got some shit for us to look at.”

Sam dips his chin once and then sets about gathering up whatever he thinks he’ll need for a briefing. There’s something glittering in his eyes though, shoulders tight with barely restrained eagerness as he hurries to pack up. 

Transparent bastard, that one.

Cas lingers on Dean just a second longer, but then walks out of the room without a word.

Dean’s head starts to hurt.


	2. A Near Collision of Stars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cas joins him while he’s still sucking sugary dye off the tip of his pointer finger. Dean releases it with a pop, not even remotely sorry.
> 
> “Anything?” Cas asks, attention flickering back and forth between Dean’s mouth and his eyes in rapid shifts..
> 
> Dean licks his lips and finds a trace of frosting. Cas scowls at his tongue before lifting his eyes for good, expression set determinedly.
> 
> “No,” Dean says, “EMF is off the charts, but we expected that.”
> 
> “Kyle was of very little assistance,” Cas sighs. “Unless you care to hear who is ‘schtupping’ whom around here.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hallo, lovelies!
> 
> Another chapter has arrived! Lots of Dean & Cas interacting in this chapter, though probably not in exactly the way we had hoped. 
> 
> Ever onward, fam.
> 
> (Sidenote: If you'd like to follow me on Twitter I'm @TearyEyedGirl. Mostly Jensen/Dean, Misha/Cas, Destiel, and SPN as a whole. Come say hi!)

It’s like a mini family reunion when they get to the motel Donna, Jody, and Eileen are holed up in. Dean doesn’t have the chance to even lift his arms to catch her before Donna is barreling into his chest and going full octopus on him, teasing him about the way his hair sticks up in wild disarray since he’s forgone product. His smile is warm and soft when he tucks her closer still and says he missed her.

Sam suffers a somewhat similar fate, though Jody is much more reserved in her attack. She simply pulls him down into the motherly kind of hug they both missed out on for most of their lives and then stretches on tippy toes to kiss his cheek and ruffle his hair. Sam’s expression is fond and genuine when he aims it down at her.

They switch and it’s Dean’s turn to bask in the maternal love Jody exudes, while Sam flinches when Donna punches him good-naturedly in the chest. The women hug Cas too, who seems more comfortable with it now than he was in the beginning. He hugs back, anyway.

While Cas is busy with an armful of Sheriff, Dean watches Sam and Eileen greet each other silently. Sam’s entire being has gone soft, from his truly epic heart-eyes to the giant sasquatch feet he spreads a little, shoulders rounded, posture relaxed. He’s signing something Dean doesn’t catch because he hasn’t studied ASL nearly enough, but Eileen returns a sharp smile that drips with sweetness and the tips of Sam’s ears turn red where they peek through his hair when she signs back.

Dean can’t help but chuckle quietly into his fist, using his eyebrows to sass right back at Sam when he aims a Bitch Face in his direction. Eileen greets Cas and Dean in turn, her hugs as welcome as the affectionately teasing words she mutters in each of their ears. Dean doesn’t know what Cas got, but the “Your boyfriend smells like lightning,” Dean gets makes his ribs tighten..

He’s on the verge of calling all of them out for being sappy, but then Donna is clapping loudly and ushering them all inside. 

The sparse furniture in the room makes getting comfortable difficult, since all they really have is a king-sized bed, a couch that probably didn’t start its life in that exact shade of grimey grey, and a rickety looking chair that all but whimpers when Dean dares to glance its way. 

Instead, they crowd around on the edges of the bed, files scattered in the space they leave open in the center.

Donna offers them a beer, which everyone accepts, save Cas. Then they’re huddled together on the bed again, Cas and Donna boxing Dean in while Sam, Eileen, and Jody languish up by the headboard.

“So, what’ve we got?” Dean asks and sips his beer.

Donna lets her smile slip down on one side. “The boys’ club wasn’t too keen on sharing their intel with a couple’a ‘midwestern skirts’, but a buddy of mine sent us what he could.”

“Skirts?” Dean mocks, offended on their behalf. “Who even talks like that anymore?”

Sam cocks a brow, smirking. “I have literally heard you use it.”

“You called our waitress a ‘skirt’ the first time we met for breakfast,” Eileen adds.

Donna and Jody set suspicious eyes on him, narrowed like they’re about to show him just what kind of ruckus a couple’a skirts can kick up. Dean can feel color crawling up the back of his neck.

“I said _anymore_ ,” he defends, expression shifty.

Dean, historically, hasn’t been the most respectful man on the planet, especially when it comes to the Love ‘em and Leave ‘em style of woman he’s always chased. Oh, he’s a gentleman and no one can claim otherwise, but there are moments when Dean maybe doesn’t give women the amount of respect they deserve.

Lately though, Dean has caught himself thinking a thought he knows every woman in his gravitation would hand him his ass over, and does the required reassessing. Nine times out of ten he can find another way to express the thought without actively being a dick.

He’s working on it.

Jody just laughs though, low and affectionate, “The way you boys were raised, I’m just thankful you're not the misogynistic toolbags you coulda been.”

Sam and Dean exchange a glance. 

Not that John was a complete pig; it was never that simple. 

But the lifestyle, hunting, it isn’t exactly a place for kids. To be honest, the lifestyle isn’t one that’s welcoming to anything pure or wholesome, much less children. Women either, or -- and probably especially -- men who don’t meet the societal “alpha male” standard.

Even though Dean tried to shield Sam from the worst of it, wearing the brunt of it on his own shoulders and being moulded by it, some of the bullshit managed to slip through. Sam’s mostly well adjusted in that department, thankfully. It took Dean a long time to convince a prepubescent Sammy that his penchant for sappy love songs and chick flicks weren’t black stains on his masculinity, but otherwise, his kid brother came out of their childhood more or less unscathed by it all.

Dean, on the other hand… Well, that’s more complicated.

“What’s this?” Cas asks, brandishing a sheaf of laminated papers. 

Donna takes it with a grin, handing one sheet to each of the boys. “Charlie made ‘em. Aren’t they just the handiest thing?”

Dean looks his over. It’s basically an outline of their case, right down to the contact info of former clergy and parishioners of St. Joseph’s Catholic Church, the grocery lot’s former occupant. 

“She condensed all of this,” Sam says, waving a hand at the information amassed in the center of the bed, “into a cheat sheet? Before you guys even left Sioux Falls?”

“Basically, yeah,” Eileen affirms.

Dean chuffs appreciatively. “That’s awesome.”

“I agree, Sheriff Hanscum, these could prove exceptionally helpful,” Cas says.

Donna blinks big eyes at him for a beat, like he broke her brain and she has to reboot.

“You betcha,” she eventually manages, beaming smile returning in full force. “And for the love of God, Cas, call me Donna.”

“Of course,” Cas agrees promptly. “Apologies.”

Dean knows Cas’ll still slip and call her by her formal title. He does it to Jody, after all, and he’s known her several years longer. Either way, Dean finds it cuter than it has any right to be.

“So, the ghosts?”

His question has the desired effect. Everyone immediately shifts back into case mode and Dean can once again focus on the job. Rather quickly, he learns that they don’t even have half of the story.

“Back in 1850, the rural little town of Hogshead erected St. Joseph’s smack dab in the middle of itself,” Donna tells them. “It was the only Irish Catholic church in that area of the state, so a buttload of people hoofed it in for services from all over the place.”

“Records indicate that all religious services, including funerals, were held there right up until they wrecking balled the place,” Jody says. 

Eileen refers back to Charlie's cheat sheet. “But there are reports of hauntings and other paranormal activity dating back to at least 1902.”

“That is an unmanageable quantity of suspects,” Cas, very observantly, points out.

Dean can't stop from grinning, but manages to add, “We need to narrow this down.”

“I’d ask if anybody died bloody, but considering the sheer size of the area the church served, that would probably be pointless,” Sam mutters, perusing his cheat sheet. “What about on church grounds?”

Eileen pulls a small stack of photos paperclipped to a file folder from underneath a heavy old tome, handing them to Sam.

“First recorded death we can prove happened on site is Sister Catherine McGuinness,” she explains, flipping the photos up and holding them out of the way so Sam can read the police report in the back. “She--”

“Wait,” Dean nearly growls, moving into Eileen’s line of sight and waving a hand to get her attention, “McGuinness?”

“Yeah, that’s what’s on the reports.” She frowns. “Why?”

Cas’ head tips slowly to one side, eyes full of questions. “What is it, Dean?”

“McGuinness,” Sam murmurs, sampling it for a second before he realizes he’s tasted it before. His expression hardens. “Shit.”

“What, what’d we miss?” Donna asks, taking the file from Sam so she can look at it again.

“No, you didn’t miss anything,” Dean bites out, a trickle of unease making his trigger finger itch. “It’s just that Emily -- Uh, the friend we’re crashing with, the one who called us in -- she’s a McGuinness.”

Cas’ eyes sink closed heavily, a leaden sigh escaping his mouth.

“Maybe it’s a coincidence?” Jody offers hopefully.

“Yeah, maybe.”

But Dean knows better. There’s no such thing as coincidence in their lives. It all connects somewhere. 

“What happened to her?” he asks.

Donna hands the photos to Dean this time, but he hesitates before looking down. He swallows hard and sets his mouth in an unforgiving line. Officially rallied, he makes himself look.

With the old stone church in the background, the photographs could be beautiful. The church itself is relatively plain looking, built in drab grey stone with a single high rising spire, the rest of its dormers rather squat and boring. The cross anointing the church's bell tower shines gold in the sun but casts shadows on the ground below. The one redeeming quality of the thing are the windows; they're gorgeous. Bright sunshine backlights the church and enough of it plays through the stained glass windows to illuminate jewel tones in arched frames. 

If not for the broken body of a woman lying in the foreground, the image could be art. 

It’s Sister Catherine McGuinness, far as Dean can tell. Her body is shattered, limbs askew at awkward, painful angles, neck twisted nearly all the way around. Blood coats the majority of the scene, including the grass beneath the body. Catherine’s eyes remain open in death. Even though they are dark and lifeless, Dean recognizes them.

His stomach rolls.

“Jesus Christ.”

Cas scoops the pictures up when Dean throws them down, grimly taking in every detail. 

“This is horrendous,” Cas says, flat and emotionless. 

Dean might feel the need to throw a punch or something just for the lack of emotion in it, but part of him knows Cas’ cool demeanor is his way of balancing out Dean’s rage.

“What did this?” Sam asks, taking the photos from Cas. “It doesn’t really jive with what we usually see. It's too...”

“Messy?” Dean suggests. “Disorganized, but not in a feral werewolf kinda way?”

“That’s because it was done by a human,” Jody says. “Rumor is she was thrown from the bell tower by a spurned suitor.”

Dean’s vision goes a hazy red around the edges.

Donna nods. “Even in the sticks, you see your fair share of legitimate crazies. That right there is a psychopath if I ever saw one.” 

There’s an old familiar rage burning low in Dean’s belly. 

Monsters -- they’re one thing. 

Monsters are relatively simple. They just want to watch the world burn while having a blast and hanging on for the ride. It’s what they are; it’s in their DNA. Feeding, fighting, fucking, and just generally blowing shit up -- that’s the long and short of it for monsters. 

Humans, though… Humans are a horse of a whole different color. 

Human evil isn’t inherent. 

Sure, some people are simply born wrong. Some are born with the darkness already in their soul. Some human evil is created, either by circumstance or design. 

However, for the most part, people are just people. They aren’t purely good or wholly evil, they’re simply human. They make mistakes like everybody else and, if they’re lucky, they learn what not to do the next time. Majority of people just want to live their lives the best they can and hope they stumble through some good shit along the way. 

The ones born with that darkness though, the ones who feed it or see it force-fed, they’re the ones that make Dean’s skin crawl. 

People like that _choose_ to be monsters. Whatever it is that makes them into what they are, they’re the ones that allow themselves to sink into the dark and revel in it. Embrace it. They enjoy the darkest parts of themselves. Those people will use whatever means necessary to get what they want, no matter what it costs the people around them, because they gave up their humanity and legitimately cannot care. 

It’s selfish. Selfish and twisted, and Dean would rather just slay monsters. It would save him the astounding pressure of guilt that presses down on him, the subtle burn in his forearm where Cain’s Mark used to reside.

“Alright, lay it on me,” Dean says, shoving himself up off the bed to pace around the limited floor space.

Donna hesitates for less than a breath, then she stands too and props her hip against the wall by the bathroom. She’s not in the path of Dean’s pacing, just putting them on an even keel.

“Sister Catherine was eighteen years old when she got to St. Joseph’s. Pretty much fresh off the boat from the homeland,” Donna tells them, “The head honcho over there at the time was a Father Patrick O’Reilly. He was her mentor, showing her the ropes and whatnot. Looks like she mostly stuck to the orphanage, far as duties go. Anywho, she was there barely a year when she put in for a transfer.”

“Did she give reason for abandoning her post?” Cas asks.

Dean can guess. He prays he’s wrong.

“The records are kind of thin for the time period,” Jody explains. “So, at least from an official standpoint, no.”

“But?” Dean prompts.

Eileen abandons her spot beside Sam on the bed and comes to stand in Dean’s path. He stops, arms crossed over his chest in what he knows is a defensive way but he’s stuck with it now. He waits.

Eileen offers him a compassionate smile, one he recognizes from Sam’s arsenal, and gives it to him straight. 

“Father Patrick was a perv.” 

Damn it, he wanted to be wrong.

“According to the local rumor mill, the Padre had a wandering eye,” Eileen goes on. “And on several occasions, other wandering parts. There’s a list of alleged victims on Charlie’s sheet.”

“So, what,” Sam posits, “Godless priest goes postal when the girl he’s repeatedly attempted to sexually assault makes a break for it?”

“Succinct,” Jody frowns.

“No one helped them?”

Cas’ question, with its horrified, genuine disbelief, makes Dean’s heart threaten to climb right up into his throat. Of course they didn’t do anything; not back then. No one talked about that kinda thing when Catherine and her convent were likely suffering. Jesus, they barely talk about shit like that now. 

“Maybe not,” Dean says, voice gruff, “but we can sure as hell do something about it now.”

Sam’s brow creases even as Eileen sinks back down beside him. “Dean, we don’t even know for sure that Sister Catherine is one of our ghosts.”

“So what, she doesn’t deserve justice?” 

“No, man, that’s not what I... Look, how about we focus on figuring all this out so we can make things better for Pepper and her coworkers. And then -- if it turns out Sister Catherine isn’t one of our ghosts -- then we can look into what happened and see what kind of skeevy shit O’Reilly was up to.”

Okay, Dean is pretty sure he can manage that.

“Fine,” he says, too brightly, “What do we have that we can actually move on?”

“That’s sort of the problem,” Jody supplies, gesturing at the pile on the bed. “We almost have _too much_ information on this one. Between official police reports, historical society and church records, what Charlie dug up and the little bit Donna squeezed out of her connection, it’ll take hours to sift through everything.”

“Longer, probably,” Eileen throws in. 

“The cheat sheets are a huge help for the quick stuff,” Donna says, “but there’s still a ton of research, and I’m guessing no one’s been to the scene yet?”

“Sweetheart, we haven’t even had lunch yet,” Dean drawls.

Donna rolls her eyes but she’s grinning. “Well, that just won’t do, will it?” she says. “How about we make a grub run and then tear into this heap of dung?”

Dean looks around the tiny, drab motel room and wrinkles his nose. “This place doesn’t exactly scream ‘base of operations’ to me.”

“It’s a motel room, Dean. If it’s conversing with you in any way, perhaps you have had enough of this,” Cas says, and boldly plucks the beer from Dean’s grasp, raising it to his own lips.

Donna’s eyebrows wing up and Dean can’t see the rest of them with Cas standing so close, but he knows at least Sam is smothering a laugh.

It doesn’t matter though, because heat is already curling like vines in the base of Dean’s spine and it has nothing to do with embarrassment. Yeah, Cas just scolded him for his drinking, in front of like half the people they know, but that wasn’t the point of his display at all. He gave up a long time ago on trying to change Dean’s drinking habits. 

Trying to change Dean at all, really.

The way Cas let his tongue linger at the mouth of the bottle, the way his eyes shimmered with mischief while he stared Dean down… 

It’s a distraction Cas knows works.

“Dean?”

He snaps to attention, finally breaking eye contact. Everyone looks at him like he’s losing it, so he shakes his head and waves a hand dismissively.

“I’m fine.”

There’s an awkward pause and then Sam chuckles and says, “Thanks for the update, dude, but I was asking what you wanted to do next.”

His eyes are far too knowing.

Dean clears his throat and avoids looking anyone else directly in the eye. Sam’s bad enough, he doesn’t want to see what the women have written in theirs.

“Let me make a call.”

 

***

 

By some crazy turn of events (read: Dean’s very strenuous efforts), Cas and Dean are elected to visit the scene. Well, not the scene so much, since its been about a week and management replaced the offending frosting mixer days ago, but the site, anyway. Donna and Jody are headed to the morgue, Sam and Eileen are interviewing victims, and Dean and Cas get to check out Spook Central.

They stopped at Emily’s to change and drop off the rest of the team, since Em so graciously agreed to lend them the use of her home as a functional homebase while they’re in town. They decided to hold off on hunting down a bite to eat until after they make some headway in the case. 

_Call it incentive_ , Sam had prodded. Dean calls it cruelty, but he was out-voted.

The giant chain grocery is pretty much exactly what Dean expects, inside and out. Places like this don’t differ very much from place to place: same formulaic layout, same overly bright fluorescent lights, same slightly sticky, cheap linoleum floors, same dead-eyed cashiers.

They cut a direct path to the front office and Dean raps his knuckles lightly against the locked door. When it opens, a harassed looking redhead appears in the doorway, his short-sleeved white button-up wrinkled and green tie slightly off-center.

The guy looks like he hasn’t slept in days, and by the sound of his voice that might be accurate.

“Can I help you?”

Dean drags his FBI credentials out of his jacket’s interior breast pocket, Cas following suit, and flashes it.

“Agent Plant,” he says, then gestures at Cas, “My partner, Agent Perry. You in charge around here?”

The guy pales a little, which is impressive since his skin is already nearly translucent. “Uh, yes?”

Dean scowls. “You don’t sound sure about that.”

Cheeks going faintly blotchy, the guy clears his throat and pulls himself up to his full height. He’s still shorter than both Dean and Cas by several inches, but it seems to help his confidence.

“Kyle Ryan,” he says, opening the door wider and waving them in. “I’m the acting GM.”

They follow him inside the cramped room rather reluctantly. There isn’t even a window inside, but there’s enough office furniture to fill a goddamn showroom. And despite the fact that ninety-nine percent of the world’s population has gone digital, there are filing cabinets literally lining all four walls. Dean feels claustrophobia tickle the back of his neck. 

“We are here to speak with you about Kevin Harris,” Cas announces before Dean can.

Kyle shrugs, like he figured as much. “I don’t know what more I can tell--”

“We would like to inspect the scene ourselves, if you would be so amenable,” Cas cuts him off.

Frowning, Kyle looks between them, unsure. “Uh, the mixer was junked a few days ago, guys,” he says. “Corporate even shelled out to replace the floor. There’s nothing to see.”

Dean lets his expression harden and catches the guy’s eye. “That wasn’t a request.”

With a gulp, Kyle scurries for the door. Cas and Dean follow at a more leisurely pace, Dean smirking when Cas pulls a weary face at him. 

He’s hangry, sue him.

The shiny new industrial-sized standing mixer gleams where its predecessor used to sit, and the rest of the bakery’s kitchen follows its example. There isn’t so much as a rogue speck of flour mussing up the pristine space. It reminds Dean of his kitchen in the bunker -- because that bitch is his, no matter what Sam tries to tell himself -- and he’s hit with a wave of homesickness. 

It’s nice that he can feel that now, for a place that isn’t on four wheels. Baby will always be Home, but the bunker is a solid, immovable refuge that belongs to them and them alone. It’s something they never thought they’d have and Dean already wants to return to it.

Kyle was right, there isn’t much to be found in the kitchen. Dean looks around anyway while Cas questions him some more. 

The EMF meter lights up like the Vegas skyline as soon as Dean flips it on, so he pockets it just as quickly and pokes through cupboards and shelves on the off chance there’s a hex bag or cursed coin or something stowed away there, but he finds squat. 

Of course it couldn’t be that simple.

Dean wanders deeper into the kitchen, head on a swivel. He’s far enough away now that he can’t hear Cas and Kyle talking beyond a quiet murmur. He tunes them out entirely and narrows his eyes at the kitchen, looking for anything that will make this visit worth the gas.

There are cupcakes resting on a long steel table in the back of the kitchen, freshly frosted in pastel shades of green and blue. When Dean spots them, his stomach rumbles. It’s not exactly what he had in mind, but he’s also not about to look a gift horse in the mouth. He hardly bothers resisting the urge to swipe his finger through the frosting of an especially enticing blue dessert.

Cas joins him while he’s still sucking sugary dye off the tip of his pointer finger. Dean releases it with a pop, not even remotely sorry.

“Anything?” Cas asks, attention flickering back and forth between Dean’s mouth and his eyes in rapid shifts..

Dean licks his lips and finds a trace of frosting. Cas scowls at his tongue before lifting his eyes for good, expression set determinedly.

“No,” Dean says, “EMF is off the charts, but we expected that.”

“Kyle was of very little assistance,” Cas sighs. “Unless you care to hear who is ‘schtupping’ whom around here.”

Dean laughs, then turns and grabs two cupcakes off the table behind him. “Maybe later,” he says. “Right now, I think we’ve earned these.”

He hands the green confection to Cas and then unceremoniously shoves the partially-unwrapped blue one into his own mouth. It’s too sweet by half, but the cake is light and moist and it’s helping abate the worst of his hunger. 

Cas looks helplessly amused again, so Dean smiles widely, showing off stained teeth. Through a still mostly full mouth he garbles, “Wanna grab dinner?” and Cas shakes his head, taking a more delicate bite of his own cupcake.

Cas chews and swallows, murmuring happily to himself, but shrugs. “We are already here,” he says, voice thick from the frosting. “It would be expeditious to simply purchase the required ingredients for a meal and bring them back to Emily’s.”

Dean hadn’t been thinking about cooking for everyone, was planning on hitting a diner he knows is right around the corner from Em’s place, but now that Cas brings it up…

He finishes off his cupcake and tosses the yellow paper liner into a nearby trash can, then starts for the door.

“Wait,” Cas calls, throwing the rest of his own cupcake into the can as well before following, “What about the case?”

Dean pivots to face him, but continues to walk backward toward the door that leads out onto the main floor. 

“We’ll keep an eye out for anything hinky while we shop,” Dean assures. “You feeling burgers?”

 

***

 

The basket Cas has hooked over his forearm is full of groceries, more than just what’s needed for dinner. They haven’t seen so much as a flickering light as they’ve made their way through the bulk of the store though. If he didn’t know better Dean would think the place is a ghost-free zone, but he trusts Emily’s instincts. 

Besides, Pepper is scared of _something_. You can’t manufacture that kind of fear.

It isn’t until they’re in the floral department that Cas suddenly goes rigid beside him and the other shoe drops. Dean looks up from the bouquet Cas insisted they buy for Emily -- a hostess gift, of sorts -- and sees that Cas’ attention is fixed squarely ahead, but his eyes keep shifting ever-so-slightly to his left.

“What is it?” Dean asks, already reaching for his gun where it’s resting against the small of his back, tucked into his slacks and hidden by his blazer.

Cas is quiet and Dean doesn’t think he’s going to answer, but then the air temperature around them plummets and he doesn’t have to.

Gripping Dean by the forearm, Cas prevents him from drawing his weapon. “It’s the children,” he says without turning. “They are… unbearably sad.”

“Can you see them?” Dean asks as he scans their immediate area. 

There’s nothing but a forest of flowers, ribbons, and mylar balloons in front of them. Behind them, a wall with an open-air cooler houses a wide selection of beer. There are a pair of civilians weighing their options, but they pay no mind to what’s going on around them. No one else is in sight.

Cas shakes his head, expression solemn. “Nothing more than glimpses as of yet. I can, however, feel them.”

Something white flashes in Dean’s peripheral vision and he resists the urge to turn toward it. It happens again, this time forming into something he can actually sorta see. It’s the little girl Pepper mentioned, far as he can tell. He gets the impression of swinging, curley-Q pigtails and a white dress, but it’s gone again before he’s sure.

“You see the boy?” Dean asks, shifting to angle his body more toward Cas without looking directly to his left.

“Yes, I believe so,” Cas says quietly. “His attire suggests he is from the same time period Sister Catherine belonged to.”

Dean makes the mistake then of trying to see the boy for himself, but Cas’ frame immediately loses its tension, a vase shatters somewhere behind the floral counter, and the air around them warms noticeably.

“Damn it,” Dean sighs, releasing his gun.

“The children appear quite shy,” Cas notes. He takes the cellophane and lace wrapped bouquet from Dean’s other hand and lays it carefully in his basket, on top of everything else so it doesn’t get squished, then meets Dean’s gaze. “Or perhaps they’re simply afraid.”

“Afraid of what?” Dean says, following Cas’ lead when he tips his head toward the front of the store, in the direction of the check-out area. “They’re dead, Cas -- what do they have left to be afraid of?”

When they’re in line at a register, Cas unpacks the basket and drops it down with a stack of its empty brethren stowed away underneath the conveyer. 

“Dean. You know, perhaps better than most, that a human’s existence can be infinitely more frightening after death than it ever was while walking the Earthen plane,” he finally responds.

And… again, that’s fair.

“Okay,” Dean relents as they shuffle forward in line, “So, what then? What could be fugly enough in this joint to scare a couple’a dead kids?”

The cashier, who is scanning their groceries, casts horrified eyes his way and Dean shrugs, smile almost apologetic.

“$38.59,” the kid mutters, backing away a few steps without actually leaving his station.

Cas rolls his eyes and shifts aside so Dean can insert a credit card into the reader. “It’s almost as though you are not, in fact, a professional hunter.”

“Bite me,” Dean chuckles. He gets a receipt and then gathers up their bags, making for the door with Cas in-step beside him. “The kid works here, I’m sure he knows about the ghosts.”

“You are the one that told me knowing and _knowing_ are different things,” Cas points out as he unlocks the Impala. He opens the back door for Dean to deposit the bags, then Cas leans over the door, arms crossed beneath his chin where they rest on the metal. He watches silently while Dean carefully places the flowers in the rear window. 

When Dean straightens up and faces Cas, he rests one hand on the open door beside Cas’ elbow. He leans in and doesn’t notice. 

Most of the time, when Dean gets closer than he means to, it’s because he doesn’t realize he’s doing it. It’s automatic -- chemistry or instinct or some shit.

Whatever. He’s used to it.

“That’s twice,” Dean says. It’s soft, ridiculously soft, but he’s used to that too. “You’ve scolded me twice today, Cas. Something on your mind?”

The flirtatious edge doesn’t appear to go unnoticed -- by either of them. 

In fact, it’s rather blatant.

That, Dean is not used to.

Cas either apparently, because his expression turns gently questioning. He does not, however, pull away. Instead he leans a fraction closer, head tilting at an adorable angle. 

“My mind is a cacophony of infinite time and space, Dean,” Cas murmurs. His tongue flicks out to dampen pillowy pink softness as his eyes fall, getting caught on Dean’s mouth. “You will have to be more specific.”

The dare ringing in his words hits Dean like a glancing blow to the cerebral cortex. He sucks in a breath to replace the one punched out of him, fingers tightening vise tight on Baby’s black metal. The air he pulls in brings with it a scent that is all Cas. 

Eileen’s sense of smell is on point -- Castiel smells like lightning.

Throat tight, Dean tries to swallow down the pounding heart lodged in his airway. Cas won’t release his gaze, but he’s also not really trying all that hard to free it. Who would willingly look away from a bottomless ocean -- impossibly, ethereally blue -- when it waves back with such obvious, endless devotion?

Dean shifts forward, letting the hard jut of his hips and chest push up flush with Baby’s door. If not for that last barrier he would be pressed all along the solid line of Cas’ body, willing and pliant, and that thought alone does really awesome things to his insides.

It is a pretty solid barrier to anything really interesting, though. With its layers of steel and plastic and dead air, the door presents a false sense of security.

And maybe that’s what kicks Dean in the ass, because the next thing falling out of his mouth is, “I don’t know, Sweetheart... Seems to me you know exactly what I’m talking about.”

 _Hoolllllllly fuck_ , he really just said that. All bold flirtation and a cocksuredness he really doesn’t feel. He called Cas sweetheart like it was his name and everything, for christ’s sake..

Cas, for all his hardass bluster and sassy quips, just blinks, appearing momentarily at a loss. 

Which gives Dean time to think -- which is always a disastrous idea. When it comes to anything even remotely related to the Him & Cas Thing, time to think equals time to spiral, and Dean actually doesn’t need all that much time to completely freak himself the fuck out.

“Right.”

“Dean, wait,” Cas tries, but he’s already moving away, closing the door between them while Cas stumbles upright. 

Dean is behind the wheel before he thinks to get there, the slam of his door echoing through the chasm that just opened up inside his head. 

At least the one in his chest finally has a companion.

He doesn’t look over when he feels the bench seat give under Cas’ weight, nor when he hears the passenger door swing shut. He can’t look at Cas and see the disappointment on his face. 

Anger, he can take. Hell, he can handle full-on angelic rage, but Dean can’t take seeing yet another disappointment reflecting in Cas’ eyes.

“Dean.”

“No,” he snaps. It’s meaner than he meant it, so he softens it with a sigh and tunnels a hand through his hair while his other hand turns over the engine. “Look, Cas, I… That -- what I just said, I didn’t mean… I mean, I meant it obviously, but I… I didn’t mean to bring it up right now, that’s all. We’ve got a lot going on, and now isn’t the right time to go sorting through a decade’s worth of shit.”

“Oh,” Cas breathes.

He’s relieved, and that gives Dean the courage to keep talking as he maneuvers out of the parking lot and back out onto the road. 

“We need to talk about some stuff, you know? Before we…”

“Talk about the other stuff?” Cas offers sardonically.

Dean chuckles dryly. “Yeah, actually. There’s stuff you don’t know, Cas. About me, about who I am now. Stuff that might change how you feel about… stuff.”

“Dean,” Cas says. 

It isn’t patient or gentle or disappointed, or any of the things Dean can’t hear right now. He says it like Dean’s an idiot and that, at least, Dean can handle.

“I take exception to your assertion that there is anything I do not, or could ever know about you that would change _anything_ ,” Cas tells him. Like it’s an irrefutable fact. “I have touched the very nuclei you are built of, Dean Winchester. I may not know all there is to know about _who_ you are, but I know _what_ you are, what you will always be, and that… That is unshakeable.”

Dean is flabbergasted. Not that Cas feels any of that -- Dean’s pretty much always known what the score is between them. What surprises him is that Cas actually said it out loud. 

They don’t do that. 

They also don’t call each other sweetheart though, so maybe they’re both breaking new ground.

“You can’t know that, man,” he says, rather than examining too closely the monumental shift that’s just occured between them. “Shit changes around here at the speed of light. Someday -- soon even -- something could tear through and fuck everything up. You can’t promise you’ll never want to leave again, or that you won’t end up hating me. No one can make a promise like that.”

“I am not most people, Dean. And I can promise you that I could never hate you!” Cas says, nearly laughing at the preposterousness of Dean suggesting otherwise. “I will always have to leave your side, at least for a time. That is the life we choose to lead. But have I not proven to you by now that I will always return? To the bunker, to Team Free Will… To you.”

Dean’s throat burns but he ignores it, attention focused firmly on the road. “And what happens when you leave and don’t come back?” he asks, voice gruff with emotions he’s been suppressing for what feels like eternity. “What am I supposed to do then?”

Cas looks across the seat, eyes wide and shining with pained sincerity. “You keep fighting, Dean. Until your fight is over and I am beside you once more.”

Silence fills the car for so long Dean has started counting the heartbeats he can hear pounding in his ears. He should probably try thinking of something witty or sarcastic to throw back, but he’s having trouble even remembering to breathe, so it all seems beyond him.

They’re pulling up curbside at Emily’s by the time either of them speaks again.

“Cas, I’m sor--”

“I don’t want your apologies, Dean,” Cas says quietly, meeting his eye across the seat with one set of fingers wrapped around the door handle. “You apologize far too often for things that are not your fault. Let this simply be what it is. At least for tonight.”

He’s gone before Dean can argue.


	3. I've Got You, Brother

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Why is it that you seem one hundred percent ready to accept being the only hunter without someone to come home to?” Sam questions, voice gone sadder yet. “You deserve--”
> 
> “Sam, man, please,” Dean cuts in, a sharp stab of pain lancing through him. “Look, I know you’re trying to help, but you really, _really_ aren’t.”
> 
> “Answer the question and I’ll drop it.”
> 
> “For fuck’s -- Fine!” Dean punches the back wall of the shower, hard enough to rattle the metal hooks holding the shower curtain to its rod. “You and Eileen, all the others... It’s just different. _I’m_ different. Maybe I do deserve something good, but whatever that is, little bother, it probably ain’t Castiel: Angel of the Lord."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, KnitWit, this one's for you!
> 
> All the brother feels ahead, lovelies! Lots of Dean feels too, by way of DeanCas feels, so... Just, a lot of feels in here today.

Emily’s impressive Chef’s kitchen empties with predictable speed once dinner has been cooked, eaten, and cleared away. It’s spotless once more, a lone cheeseburger on a plate, wrapped in plastic, sitting in the center of the massive granite island while Dean keeps watch. He managed to locate a vase at some point in the evening and has since filled it full of water and white lilies, propping it beside the plate for ambiance or whatever.

The whole house is quiet, the direct opposite of what it was a mere hour before. A kitchen full of hunters, no matter the size, is a recipe for disaster. Worse so, maybe, when they’re all family. 

They managed. 

Mostly because Dean forced everyone onto a stool at the island’s edge and set them to work in order to keep them from getting under his heels while he manned the grill. The lot of them sifted through case files, tossing around ideas and filling in blanks for one another where they could. 

Dean completely tuned out on everything case-related. His head was too full of Cas and trying to sort out where they stood now -- he’d have to compartmentalize eventually, but zoning out while cooking was basically meditating, and Dean could use a little zen.

Any awkwardness he expected on Cas’ end never came to fruition, though the Angel was uncharacteristically quiet throughout. No one noticed but Eileen, and she made a concentrated effort to get Cas to engage. Dean saw him laugh when Eileen pegged him with one of the baby carrots Sam snacked on while they worked. 

It was enough.

Afterward, everybody scattered. Emily wouldn’t be home for at least another hour or two, and rather than debriefing everyone twice Dean made the executive decision to ban all case-related talk until after eight PM. That left a handful of hours to screw around in, so Dean was almost inevitably the only one left in the house. 

Sam and Eileen went to some photography exhibit they found a few towns over. It was pretty low-key for Sam’s typical date night style, but work was work and Dean knows they take advantage of what little they can. Jody and Donna were Chuck-knows where, but the gleam in Jody’s eye when they left scared him into not asking any questions. And Cas…Dean isn’t sure exactly where his Angel has gotten off to, and that scares him as well. 

More often than not, Dean has at least a vague idea of where Cas can be found. Maybe not down to a perfect set of coordinates or anything, but he can find him if he needs to. When Cas left Emily’s though, he didn’t say where he was going or when he would return. 

He just left.

It’s been a while since Cas pulled a Houdini on him. The dude chose a terrible time to pick the habit back up, but there was little Dean could do to protest it, so he didn’t bother. Still, not knowing where Cas disappeared to makes legitimate anxiety hum under Dean’s skin.

All in all, Dean finds the kitchen colder than he’d like. The whiskey in his glass only accomplishes so much by way of warming it, but Winchesters aren’t quitters so he keeps drinking. He starts feeling jittery after a while and wanders into the living room for a book, then returns to his stool with a copy of some bodice-ripping mystery romance novella and settles in to read.

“That’s a good one,” Emily’s voice startles him. Dean looks up from the book he’s more than halfway through to find her padding barefoot across the hardwood floors, eyes hungry on the burger waiting for her. “The stable boy did it.”

He slaps the book down with a lopsided grin. “Spoiler alert.”

Emily shrugs as she stretches onto tiptoes to pull the burger toward her, unwrapping it as soon as it’s close enough. “You hate surprises.”

Dean can’t argue with that.

“Where is everybody?” Emily asks, then takes a huge bite of the burger, moaning appreciatively even though it’s long since gone cold.

“Out,” Dean reaches for the bottle and refills his glass. “Got a lot to go over when they get back.”

Nodding, Emily forces her mouthful down. “Your Angel gone too?”

Dean swishes whiskey around his teeth before he actually swallows it, then hisses a breath out through pursed lips. “‘Course he is.”

Narrowed eyes reach for his. “Don’t do that.”

Dean scoffs, “Do what?”

“Pretend that you don’t care when you haven’t stopped thinking about it since he left.”

Hammer, meet nail.

“Anyone ever tell you you’re a know-it-all?” Dean asks, tone accusatory. He throws back more whiskey and waits for Emily to finish chewing, wishing like hell he was drunker than he is.

“Badge of honor, dick,” she sasses, then swipes his glass and takes a sip. Her voice is softer when she says, “He’s gonna come back, Dean. He always does.”

He gives her a hard look, but she simply stares right back at him, unbothered, and inhales more of the burger.

A few beats pass in silence, but Dean decides to just spit it out. “I think I fucked up.” 

Emily is still chewing, but she uses her eyebrows to indicate she expects him to clarify. He groans low in his chest and casts his eyes toward the ceiling. 

“There was a thing,” he tells the tiles. “Maybe I got carried away, or maybe I just got brave for a second, but I started something I knew I wasn’t ready to finish and I… Look, I’m not an idiot, okay?”

Emily stays silent -- just sets her plate in the sink and then climbs onto the stool beside him with another glass. She pulls the vase of flowers over and breathes them in, smiling thanks before she sets them aside and gives Dean her undivided attention.

“There’s obviously something there, with me and Cas,” he fingers the rim of his glass, not tearing his eyes away from the ceiling tiles. “Has been for a long time. And we both feel it, I know we do -- but we never talk about it. That’s the Winchester Way, after all.”

Dean chuckles darkly, then lifts the glass to his lips. It’s always been easy to talk to Emily, emotional ineptitude notwithstanding. She’s far enough removed from his immediate circle to feel like an impartial party, while simultaneously close enough to feel like safety. 

In this, at least.

It’s why Emily still has the right number for him and Sam, even though they’ve changed at least a hundred times over the years. Not just because she’s a hunter, or a witch, or an all around amazing asset; Dean keeps in touch because Emily helps him talk. Sam wasn’t wrong when he told Cas about Emily’s skill in the ol’ fruitcake department. She’s guided Dean through dealing with his shit on more than one occasion, enough that some of the old wounds have begun to scab over. 

It’s a slow, torturous process, but because of Emily’s guidance, Dean is healing. He's full of scabs and tight pink scar tissue, but it's a long way from where he started and every scar brings him one step closer to being who he wants to be -- for Cas, for Sam, for Jack. 

For himself. 

Dean has managed to heal some cavernously deep wounds over the years, which is likely why he started picking the second he got within spitting distance of testing the durability of that mending. The moment back in the parking lot brought Dean dangerously close to confronting the possibility of reopening healed wounds. It was the first time he's even considered approaching those scars since he painstakingly knitted them back together. 

To say he panicked would be putting it mildly. And -- true to form -- Dean's self-perceived failure results in some good old-fashion self-flagellation.

“He’s too good for me, Em.” This isn’t the first time Dean and Emily have travelled this road together, but the admission scalds his tongue no matter how many times he’s said it. He knows how it sounds, how Cas would feel if he caught so much as a whiff of that insecurity, but Dean has never been able to scrub the sentiment from his brain. It has always lingered at the edges of his awareness, taunting him into submission. “He’s a friggin’ Angel, for the love of god. He’s an Angel and I... I went to Hell before I hit thirty. Not on a visitor’s pass, either. I mean, I was walking Hell on Earth there for a little while, and.. Sam and me, we’ve done some real dark shit between the two of us, but I’m… Cas is… He doesn’t deserve what I’ll do to him.”

His eyes feel like they’re on fire and his face burns, but he shoves it all down and glares at the countertop.

“Oh my god, you are the literal worst.”

Dean’s head jerks up so fast it makes him dizzy. “‘Scuse me?”

Emily settles in against the high back of her stool and crosses one leg over the other, radiating sass. 

“You heard me,” she tells him. “You are a scourge on this planet. Zero redeeming qualities. Worst thing to come out of the 70’s since the pornstache, which is truly saying something.”

“Oh, fuck yo--”

“Who cares?!” Emily explodes. Dean’s mouth clicks shut. “Seriously, Dean, who gives a rat’s ass if you used to be a Demon? Who cares if you tore it up in Hell? You carried the Mark of Cain, booey for you!”

“Hey!”

Emily sighs and sets down her drink, leaning forward to clasp Dean by the shoulder. “You’ve done some truly heinous things in your time, Dean. We all know it, probably especially Cas. And guess what? He loves your dumbass anyway.”

His lungs seize, but Dean keeps his lips pressed in a thin line.

“The bad things Cas has done,” Emily says, like she’s leading him somewhere, “Have any of them changed your mind about him?”

“Of course not, but--”

“Exactly!” she exclaims, cutting off the caveat before he can spit it out. “Cas doesn’t care about any of it. He knows every dark deed you’ve ever even considered, and he hasn’t left you, Dean. That man looks at you like he’d rather saw off his own limb than ever leave your side. You still think he’s gonna wake up someday and see something he didn’t see before, something that’ll make him run? You’ve got a better chance of hitting the lotto.”

And that’s the crux of it, isn’t it? Since this Thing started, Dean has always been afraid that Cas will leave. That Dean will do something -- cross some unforgivable line -- and Cas will decide he’s finally had enough. Or maybe Dean will give something up, something he can’t take back, and Cas will take it when he inevitably leaves Dean behind.

Or -- and probably the most nausea-inducing -- Dean could pour everything into Cas; he could give his Angel all his rage, and pain, and fear, and every grain of goodness he can scrape together, and Cas could give it all back. They could be content, hunting and together and happier than they’ve ever been, and Cas could be ripped away by Death.

It all boils down to Dean being categorically terrified. He’s paralyzed by the thought of showing that kind of vulnerability, tearing down the walls and letting Cas all the way inside, and losing everything.

“What if you’re wrong?”

Emily reaches up and cups a hand to his cheek, pulling his head around so she can look him dead in the face. He closes his eyes on reflex, but opens them after a breath. Emily’s entire face has gone soft, eyes misty and sincere. 

“I’m not.” A tiny smile curls her lips. “I promise you I’m not. But if by some crazy turn of events I am, you can come back here and I’ll marry you myself.”

That surprises a laugh right out of Dean’s chest and he lifts a hand to lay it over the one she still has resting on his cheek. He’s smiling again when he says, “Thank you,” and means it with everything he’s got.

A rustle of sound in the doorway makes Dean look over, but it’s empty. He decides that’s enough whiskey for the time being and uses two fingers to slide his drink away. Emily swipes it and pours what’s left in his glass into her own, giving a shrug when he cocks a brow.

“I had a rough day,” she says defensively. “You ever seen a clown cry?”

 

***

 

As it turns out, Sam and Eileen did more than just interview victims. 

They’ve all congregated in Emily’s office, a loose ring around the table with the map. Dean isn’t sure when everyone got back -- the only entrance he saw was Sam and Eileen themselves, who stumbled through the back door half an hour later than planned, lipstick smeared on Sam’s neck in the same shade Eileen wears on her lips -- but they all managed to find their way to the office eventually.

“So, get this,” Sam announces, unrolling a tube of paper over-top of the map, “Turns out the store doesn’t sit in the exact same spot as the church.”

“Come again?” Emily asks.

Sam points to the bottom page, a survey of the grounds St. Joseph’s occupied. “The church itself was here.” He traces the building’s outline on the paper, then lets the top piece of paper fall down. Dean sees that it’s a similar document, only it’s for the store instead. “Now it’s a parking lot. The store sits further back on the property.”

Donna twists her neck at an unnatural angle to try and see for herself. “So what was it when the church was there?” 

“Pretty much everything else,” Eileen says while Sam swaps out one roll of papers for another and spreads them out again. “The grounds also had a parochial house, dormitories and whatnot for the sisters, a huge garden, and an orphanage.”

“That would seem to support what Dean and I experienced while investigating,” Cas says. He points to what is identified as the orphanage on the layout of the church’s compound. “Is this currently the floral department?”

“Bingo,” Sam grins. He straightens up from leaning over the table, cracking his back with a wince as he goes. “Why, what happened at the store?”

Cas doesn’t look at Dean, but he won’t meet Sam’s gaze head on anymore either. Instead, he glares down at his shoes and talks to them. Regret rolls through Dean and he swallows hard, looking away when Cas starts speaking..

“The children Pepper told us about, they manifested while Dean and I were selecting a bouquet for Emily.”

“Not full corporeal or anything,” Dean clarifies, avoiding even a glance toward Cas. “And they amscrayed before we could get a good look, but we’re pretty sure they’re from the same period as Catherine.”

Sam looks between them, puzzling out whatever he finds, but maintains his focus on the job. “Fifty-fifty?”

Dean shrugs. “More like eighty-twenty. Now that we know about the orphanage though, I’d call it closer to an even hundred.”

“Alright,” Donna sighs, fists propped on her hips while she looks down at the pages on the table. “We already know that Sister Catherine was responsible for pretty much all of the jobs involving children at St. Joe’s. If we assume she’s one of our ghosts, maybe they’re attached to her?”

“What happened to keeping our options open?” Sam asks.

Jody plops her phone down on the table, its screen open to a note taking app. “That was before Donna and I found out that Sister Catherine was a regular at Sunday services, even after she was thrown from that tower,” she gestures at the phone, “That’s a firsthand account from the friendly neighborhood Medical Examiner, who grew up attending the church.”

“Wait, I think I’ve heard this legend,” Emily squints, cocking her head as she concentrates. “My parents were both atheists, so I never went to St. Joseph’s, but when I was in high school there was this story the kids used to tell, like a campfire story. Something about a nun who was murdered at the church. From what I remember, she would would show up every so often and interrupt sermons by wailing from the bell tower. I think she even trashed the rectory a bunch of times.”

Sam and Dean exchange glances, an entire conversation without saying a word.

“Em, maybe you should sit down,” Dean suggests carefully, flinching a little when her sharp gaze fixates on him.

“Oh no you don’t.” Emily advances on him slowly. “You’re not gonna kid glove me. Spill it, Winchester.”

Dean probably should have told her while they were alone earlier, he realizes that. The thought honestly never crossed his mind, which makes him feel like Asshole of the Century. He was so busy obsessing about Cas, he dropped the ball on doing this the right way. 

“Little help?” Dean shoots at Sam, who just shakes his head and crosses his arms over his stupidly wide chest in protest. 

Dean rolls his eyes, but Emily’s glare intensifies and she’s almost within striking distance, so he bites the bullet. “The nun -- Sister Catherine -- her last name was McGuinness.”

Emily’s eyes widen with surprise and her steps falter beneath her. “What -- are you sure?” she asks, looking to Sam for confirmation.

His face is creased with sympathy. “‘Fraid so.”

Emily stops entirely, less than a foot away from Dean, expression twisted in confusion. Her cheeks have paled, the flush of anger receding, and her eyes start to fill.

“Whoa, hey, don’t freak out on me,” Dean reaches out to pull her into his chest, folding her up in his arms with her face buried in his shirt. “It might not mean anything, okay? For all we know, there are a metric fuckton of McGuinness’ out there. You might not even be related.”

“No, I’m pretty sure we are. It’s not that though,” Emily sniffles, disentangling herself from Dean’s embrace. She goes straight to her desk, trembling fingertips retrieving the bracelet Dean noticed earlier. Turning to face the room, she smiles a watery smile and holds it up. Dean’s stomach freefalls toward the floor. “This bracelet belonged to my however-many-times-great aunt, Catherine Theresa McGuinness.” she murmurs, just loud enough to be heard. Her voice cracks anyway. “My dad gave it to me on my fifth birthday.”

Guilt lands a solid punch to Dean’s chest and he has to inhale sharply just to breathe again. Emily’s father died four months before her sixth birthday, almost to the day. The bracelet is the last birthday gift from a loving father to his baby girl. 

Damn it, he should have told her.

“How did your dad get the bracelet, Emily?” Sam asks delicately.

“He said that it belonged to Catherine, that she gave it to her brother Collin when she left home for the convent in America. Giving away all her worldly possession or whatever. I guess the family just kept passing it down,” she says, watching the way her own fingertips twirl the bracelet around on themselves. “I knew Catherine died in the States, but my father never…”

Dean prods gently when she doesn’t finish the trailing thought. “Em?”

Her hair swings around her shoulders as she visibly attempts to shake off whatever is flooding through her. “Uh, my dad never told me that she died here in Hogshead,” Emily shrugs, finally looking up from the bracelet. “You’d think he would have mentioned that part.”

“Maybe he didn’t know,” Donna offers. When everyone’s attention falls on her, she smiles reassuringly at Emily. “My mother was Irish. Not real big on keeping the kids in the know when it comes to family secrets and all that.”

“Even if he did know, I can tell you from experience that he would not have wanted to put something like that on you at such a young age,” Jody adds firmly.

Emily offers them a wobbly smile, pocketing the bracelet and striding back to the card table. She clears her throat and waves a hand at the diagrams, “So, Catherine has been haunting this property since her death. Why? What kept her from moving on?”

They give her a quick rundown of what they went over at the motel and Dean watches with increasing trepidation as Emily’s features morph away from grief, barreling straight into indignant anger.

“O’Rielly, he got away with everything,” she bites out, expression stoney. Her eyes glitter with rage, mossy green sparking brilliant scarlet, and Dean’s shoulders tense. 

When Sam and Dean met her, Emily had only begun to tap into her power. Even though she was a natural born witch, Emily's mother refused to allow her to hone her craft while she still lived at home, so Emily had to learn under a veil of secrecy. It wasn’t until after she left home for college that she started to fully submerge herself in magic. The Winchesters crashed into her life little more than a year later. 

Thing is, Emily isn’t nineteen anymore. She’s hardly a handful of years younger than Sam, which means her abilities have had decades to develop and strengthen. In that time, both Sam and Dean have occasionally borne witness as Emily crafted her skills. It’s the difference between a birthday candle’s flame and an insatiable wildfire. 

Dean’s not worried, exactly. He trusts Emily -- would never fight beside someone he didn’t trust, not the way he has with her. It’s not like she’s going to hurt anybody, but she could accidently ignite something in the immediate vicinity, or some other potentially hazardous display of power, if she isn’t careful to reign it in.

“Em--”

She cuts Dean off before he can really get started. ““He killed Catherine, probably who knows how many others, and he just got to live out the rest of his life scot free? He wasn’t even a suspect back then!”

A distant but loud pop reaches Dean’s ears and is immediately echoed by another as the overhead bulb explodes in a shower of sparks and glittering glass. The office is plunged into darkness and Dean heaves a heavy sigh.

His cellphone’s flashlight slashes through black at the same moment Jody and Eileen raise their own. He does a quick sweep of the room and floods with relief when Emily is still standing a few feet to his left. 

“All good?” Dean asks, glancing at everyone in turn. They’re all intact, if infinitesimally more on edge than a second ago. Even Cas’ expression has taken on a new edge of respect, if not subtle wariness. Satisfied that no one caught a stray shard, Dean rounds on Emily, making her squint and use her hand to shield against the brightness of his light when it hits her directly in the eyes. “Good job, Nessarose.”

Sam jostles Eileen’s flashlight when he jabs a victorious finger at Dean from the opposite side of the room. “I knew you stole my copy of Wicked!”

 

***

 

After nearly an hour, Donna manages to fix the circuit breaker without burning everything down, much to Sam’s endless stream of delight. Emily excused herself after telling them where to locate the fuse box, and Dean continuously debates with himself between going to talk to her and letting her have her space. Ultimately, he settles for scoping out the rest of the block to see if anybody else had a power surge.

Cas, having moved past his initial reaction, appeared mostly unperturbed by the entire thing. He stayed in the office, going through evidence by way of the candle Dean lit before he left. He knew Cas didn’t need the light, could see just fine in the darkest dark all on his own, but Dean couldn’t just leave him alone in a pitch black room -- it didn’t feel right. In the end, he lit the candle and then berated himself all the way outside for doing so.

Eileen and Jody wandered off to the living room while Donna and Sam worked on the electricity, and by the time Dean walks through it on his way back inside they’re going through something on Eileen’s phone, faces twin studies of seriousness. He’s so busy watching them fondly Dean almost smacks into Sam’s chest when he rounds the corner into the hallway and has to come up short.

Sam gives him a once over, like he expects to find evidence of Dean’s whereabouts clinging to his clothes, “Where did you go?”

“Outside.”

“Obviously. Why?”

Dean’s eyes roll in their sockets and Sam’s sigh sounds bone dry.

“Maybe I felt the call of the wild,” Dean pushes past his brother to make his way back upstairs. 

Sam follows a few paces behind, inviting himself in and closing the door behind him when they’re in Dean’s commandeered bedroom. He flops down onto the bed while Dean kicks off his dress shoes and pulls at the knot of his slack tie, loosening it further.

“What’s going on with you and Cas?” 

Shoulders immediately pinching together with tension, Dean keeps his back to the bed and concentrates on trying to unknot his tie completely, refusing to even acknowledge the question.

Sam sighs again, but it's more frustrated this time than anything. “I’ll camp out in here until you tell me what’s going on and we both know it.”

“Suit yourself,” Dean turns, wagging suggestive brows over his shoulder as he drops his hands to his belt. “I’m sleeping naked either way.”

“With or without the angel?”

Dean’s fingers freeze in their efforts and he fumbles. This can’t be happening. He spins around slowly, murderous gaze finding Sam’s only half-teasing smirk.

“You finally decided today is the day you wanna get your ticket punched?” Dean grits, jaw nearly creaking.

“You know what? So be it, man,” Sam shoots back, propping himself up in a half-assed “come at me, bro” kind of way. “I wanna know what’s going on.”

Closing his eyes, Dean growls, “Nothing is going on!” and rips his tie over his head just so he has something to throw at his brother.

“Bullshit,” Sam swats the tie out of the air before it can collide uselessly with his face. “I have eyes, Dean.”

“What -- you want a fucking cookie or something? Jesus Christ, Sam, give it a rest.”

Dean’s lungs feel too small, panic crawling like marching ants up the back of neck. He doesn’t want to talk about this. Not with Sam; not tonight. Sam watches him with such close attention it makes Dean’s skin prickle. He rolls his jaw in irritation and squeezes the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger.

“Did you guys have a fight?” Sam asks, not a grain of judgement or teasing in it. He sounds sort of concerned, if Dean wants to be generous.

He's annoyed to the point of anger and isn't feeling particularly philanthropic, so he just blows out a harsh breath, a bitter laugh trailing right on its heels. “I’m not even sure, and that’s the God’s honest.”

Sam nods, his mouth pulling down at the corners. “I knew he seemed off. What’d you do?”

“Why’s it gotta be my fault?” Dean mutters, returning to the task of removing his belt and then his button up.

“Because I’ve met you,” Sam shrugs. “And because Cas is so afraid of rocking that particular boat, odds are you’re the one that stepped in it.”

Dean grits his teeth and starts digging through his duffel, once again hoping he can ignore his brother into just giving up.

“I’m trying to help, Dean.”

A change of clothes in-hand, Dean strides past the bed with his head up but gaze averted. Sam grunts as he dismounts the bed, following him. He leans a shoulder against the bathroom door jam and boredly observes Dean’s badly disguised anxiety, frustratingly casual given they’re discussing the Dean & Cas Thing pretty blatantly. 

It isn’t the first time they’ve talked about it, not by a longshot, but there’s typically just enough willful ignorance on both of their parts to drown out the whole bisexuality of it all. 

Sam knows; Dean knows he knows -- why bother with all the frills?

Except now, Sam’s not pulling any of his punches. He’s just standing there, waiting and watching and calling things like they are, and Dean feels cornered. 

“Why now?” he asks, shoving aside the pale purple shower curtain to fiddle with the faucet controls. 

Sam’s jaw works like he’s biting something back, but he says only, “You need longer than a decade?”

Dean snorts. “I need longer than a lifetime, Sam.”

The bathroom begins to fill with steam and Dean steps out of his pants, right into the tub. The curtain closes behind him with a swish, but Sam doesn’t leave. It sounds like he makes himself comfortable on the vanity, actually. Dean keeps his mouth shut, wondering if he can drown himself right now just to end this whole conversation.

“You know that I love you either way, right?” Sam says quietly. Dean’s heart splinters. “I don’t care who you sleep with, Dean -- male, female, or any variation thereof.” Dean rinses the shampoo from his hair, really wishing Sam had better timing. His eyes prick with heat, chest tight, and he hopes he can pass off the red-rimmed eyes as a shampoo mishap. “And I don’t care who you end up with,” Sam adds, shifting around on the counter. “Just… Don’t end up alone.”

“Sam--”

“I know, I know, you don’t think we get a happily ever aft--”

“I know we don’t,” Dean manages to interject.

Sam huffs. “So what -- you think that because we’re hunters, we’re not allowed to fall in love? That because of what happened with Mom and Jess, we’re supposed to spend the rest of our lives alone?”

“Care for a recount?” Dean retorts, popping his head around the shower curtain so he can glare properly at his little brother. “The list of people we’ve gotten killed is a helluva lot longer than just Mom and Jess. People love us and they die, Sam. That’s just the way it is.”

He ducks back inside the shower before he can see the sad puppy eyes.

“Cas is not just people, Dean,” Sam argues. “And Mom is fine now!”

Dean can’t help but laugh through his nose while he scrubs a loofah across his pecs. “She was dead for most of our lives, man. In this context, I don’t think we can count that as a win.”

“And Cas?” Sam presses, refusing to let him deflect. “He’s an Angel, Dean. If anybody can survive being in our orbit, it’s him. The fact that he’s still breathing should tip the scales in his favor at least.”

Dean chews the inside of his cheek, white-knuckling his way through finishing his shower. “He hasn’t always been an Angel, Sam.”

Sam must unfold his massive frame from the vanity counter and lope his way across the bathroom, because when he rebutts his voice comes from right outside the curtain. It’s a good thing too; Dean wouldn’t have heard him otherwise, his voice dropped to a near whisper.

“Eileen is human.”

Sudsy hands stalling out over his belly, Dean draws in a steadying breath. Sam and Eileen -- that’s a cute couple if Dean’s ever seen one. He’s afraid to even entertain the thought of something happening to Eileen on their watch, afraid he could accidentally Tulpa that horror into existence.

“That’s diff--”

“Do you think I’m signing her death warrant?” Sam asks in that same sad timbre.

“I never said--”

“What about Claire and Kaia? Or Jody and Donna. Maybe Mom and Ket--”

“I swear to god, Sam, I will cut out your tongue,” Dean warns, then shoves his head under the spray to try and wash away _that_ mental image. 

Another topic he needs a lifetime to deal with.

“Why is it that you seem one hundred percent ready to accept being the only hunter without someone to come home to?” Sam questions, voice gone sadder yet. “You deserve--”

“Sam, man, please,” Dean cuts in, a sharp stab of pain lancing through him. “Look, I know you’re trying to help, but you really, _really_ aren’t.”

“Answer the question and I’ll drop it.”

“For fuck’s -- Fine!” Dean punches the back wall of the shower, hard enough to rattle the metal hooks holding the shower curtain to its rod. “You and Eileen, all the others... It’s just different. _I’m_ different. Maybe I do deserve something good, but whatever that is, little bother, it probably ain’t Castiel: Angel of the Lord. I’m like, ninety-ten on that. Either way, I’m not going to pro/con my relationship with Cas.”

“No one is asking you to,” Sam counters. “You don’t have to defend your relationship to anyone, least of all me. I’m Team Cas, remember? I would, however, like to point out that you said ‘relationship’, not ‘friendship’, and my work here is done.”

Sam keeps his word and leaves it at that. He also leaves the door open when he goes back out into the bedroom. Dean only knows Sam left at all because the stench of smugness has wafted out after him. 

Well, that and Sam walks like a fucking sasquatch.

“Bitch,” Dean yells after him.

The muffled “Jerk.” from the other room makes him grin.

**Author's Note:**

> \-- The seed idea for this fic is based on actual things that happened in my hometown. Namely, the city tearing down a church to put up a chain grocery store. I'm not kidding. Also, the OFC Pepper is loosely based on my IRL bestie, who I nicknamed Pepper when we were fourteen. Bit of author trivia for ya.
> 
> \-- The title of this fic is from the song "Church" by Fall Out Boy. It gives me all the Destiel feels, so give it a listen if you like!
> 
> \-- I'm over on twitter (@TearyEyedGirl) if you wanna come brighten my day!
> 
> \-- Lastly, the rating for this fic doesn't make sense yet, but I guarantee it will by the time we're done here.


End file.
